Indonesia continued.....

We don't seem to make the best of starts when we arrive to somewhere new..........

We took a boat from Bali to the adjacent island of Lombok which is around a hour and half away by speedboat. the boat first stopped at the Gill Islands before reaching Lombok and it looked amazing and we were gutted we wasn't getting off here. It had the kind of beaches that you would find on a poster or canvas and had no roads and just a few donkeys. We should have really got off but we bought the ticket to Lombok and we had a flight a few days later from Lombok so we didn't get off. We arrived on the island, but the boat stopped in the middle of nowhere, in a tiny village, a million miles from anywhere. We got off the boat and looked for a bus or taxi to where the majority of the hotels in Senggigi, but were informed by a few poeple that there was no taxis or buses which seemed a bit suspicious. Two men, no older than us approached us and said they will take us to the main town which was 5 miles away for a stupid amount of money. When we refused ,we walked up to the main road to look for a taxi and a couple of them passed whilst we were on the roadside. These two locals were making sure we wasn't getting in a taxi as they were trying to con us. We were basically stuck in the same place for half hour not moving, but then the two boys finally stopped trying to rip us off and offered us a reasonable price. At this point we didn't trust them one bit so we decided we wasn't getting in a car with them no matter what especially after they had caused us so much hassle. A taxi driver finally stopped and offered to take us but on leaving he had to give the two men money to shut them up, he told us they were bad people and they do this to everyone getting off the boat at this isolated pier. The taxi driver was nice and took us to a cheap place for the night as we had a villa booked for 2 nights the day after. Another stressful beginning to a new island.

The villa we had to ourselves for a barmy £24

The place we stayed in for a night was probably the worse place we have stayed in our travels but it was only 7 pound for the night including breakfast. We knew we had a shared villa the day after that we booked online for a barmy 24 pound the night after but one night was one too many. The room was terrible, toilet roll was not included and had to pay for, no flush, ants everywhere....it was bad! I didn't want to stay in the room for too long so I went for a walk and left Georgia in the room. I thought I would try and find the villa to try and cheer me up and I thought that I found it. It turned out to be someone's house on top of a hill overlooking the valley. I had a nice chat with the owner for a while and thought I would head back because Georgia would have been a nervous wreck being away from me for a whole hour and probably making up a million scenarios of how I could have been run over, kidnapped, got lost etc....

She preferred doing this to trekking, it was hard to disagree

We made it through the night and we arranged for the owner of the villa to pick us up from the poor excuse of a room which turned out to be a 5 minute drive away. The villa was beautiful and our room even had it's own kitchen. The villa consisted of 3 rooms but we were the only one staying there so we had the villa to ourselves for 2 nights! We spent our 2 days mainly around the pool after finding out that the only excursions in Lombok was a 3 day trek to the top of the volcano.
I didn't mind trekking but Georgia didn't agree with me lol...to be fair I didn't mind, we was staying in the nicest place since when we was staying with my Mum and Dad a month ago. The owner was American and his wife was Indonesian and they were nice enough and offered to take us to the bus stop which was 5 minutes away to catch our flight from the Airport. Before our flight in the evening we had a nice lunch on the beach when the weather decided to take a turn for the worse. We ended up walking back to the villa in torrential rain as the roads turned to rivers and was only saved by the umbrella that the restaurant on the beach decided to give us after we said we had a flight to catch!

We made it to the bus, we were the only one on it to begin with which allowed us to sing along to the radio blaring out "All Rise" by Blue lol. The airport was not so good, our hour long flight was delayed by an almighty 4 hours due to operational and technical problems which we was annoying and worrying.

I do love a map lol

The airline had a history of crashes and the plane wasn't much bigger than my Citeron C2 with propellas. We were flying to Surabaya on the island of Java. When we landed we couldn't find our hotel for over a hour and by this time it was past midnight, our hotel turned out to be on an industrial estate which was guarded by an army of rats. It seemed like we was going from one extreme to another regarding our hotels.

The next day in Surabaya we visited a cigarette factory which doesn't sound thrilling but there's not much else to do there apparently to Tripadvisor. It was actually quite an experience as we saw the factory where Indonesian's biggest brand of cigarettes were made. Each cigarette was individually hand-rolled and packed by an army of about 300 women. It was a bit like the factory out of Willy Wonka in fast-motion. Each cigarette was rolled in a second, and a pack of 20 being packaged up in about 2 seconds, I am not exaggerating by the way. I think Georgia has put pictures up on Facebook so take a look, because I can't really begin to describe it and the speed in which they was working! Oh and by the way, a pack of 20 cigarettes in a shop costs a pound! That was it for Surabaya apart from the fact that our hotel was next to a shopping mall and we had a sneaky Pizza Hut and went in the games arcade.

Each individual cigarette was hand-rolled in a second!

Our final stop was Yogyakarta which was a 5 hour train journey way. We didn't manage to get seats together which was annoying and I ended up sitting next to a doctor who seemed adamant on me posing for photos on his blackberry and adding me on Twitter! I didn't let him have my Facebook, he isn't that lucky! We checked into our guest house which was nice with a good set of owners and staff. We were also located on a touristy strip, which is just what we needed, as we needed a laundrette, an internet cafe, travel agents and some decent restaurants. The main tours to do in and around the town was to visit ancient Hindu temples and seemed quite interesting. When we found out that the entrance fee was 2 pound for locals and 15 pound for foreigners we were a bit put off, especially after visiting Angkor Wat in Cambodia which was a Wonder of the World and is probably impossible to beat regarding ancient temples so we decided to look for something else to do.

Volcano, last erupted 2010 killing nearly 400 people! 

About 20 miles away from the town is an active volcano, and after missing out on trekking and visiting the volcano on Lombok, it was something that I wanted to see and do. It didn't involve trekking which suited Georgia so we headed to the base of the volcano on a buses that took 2 and half hours to get there! We arrived in the afternoon and found out that the "lava tour" costed around 20 pound per jeep and lasted around 90 minutes, so me using my superb initiative decided to find someone that was willing to share the jeep and split the cost and we ended up doing the tour with two locals. You may think why are locals going on the tour? Let me explain.....

Burnt out house from the lava

Me being cool obviously

The volcano last erupted in November 2010 and the lava tours started running last year so it was a fairly new tour to show what the most recent and largest eruption did. The eruption wiped out villages, melted cars and houses and killed around 300 people as it erupted in the middle of the night and there was no warnings as people slept. The tour was done using Jeeps from WW1 to navigate the dried lava and the ash that the eruption left behind. We visited a woman's house that was destroyed which she has now turned into a museum which shows what the lava done to all her belongings which was quite shocking! We were also lucky as it was a clear day and had a good view of the volcano as it is usually hidden behind the clouds. The guide didn't speak English but luckily enough the two locals that we were sharing the Jeep with translated and explained what the guide was saying. The wildlife was already growing back through the ash but the once flowing rivers were completely dry due to the lava drying up the rivers to the present day. We got back to the base village at around 5pm to discover the last bus was at 3pm which was awkward! The two men we shared the Jeep with was part of a big family and they could see we was in a bit of trouble and offered to take us back to our hotel as their house was only round the corner to our guest house which was kind of them! The car journey home involved listening to Elvis and UB40 and only took 40 minutes compared to the 2 and half hours it took on the bus on the way.

Yogyakarta also has a couple of things to do including a famous shopping street where we managed to get a few gifts as we only have a few nights before we head home. It is now 11 o clock at night and our flight to Singapore is at 7am so I better get some sleep! Goodnight